Peter Chan adopted a dementia care motto as his directing rule for new drama
Director Peter Chan Ho-sun found the guiding principle for his new Toronto International Film Festival drama, "The Road Not Taken," in a dementia care facility in Chengdu, per Variety. While researching the film about early-onset Alzheimer's, Chan was given an eight-word phrase used to counsel families: "go with the flow, know when to stop."
Chan tells Variety he applied the motto to his own filmmaking process. The phrase, which advises caregivers not to argue with a patient's shifting reality but to recognize when to let go, became his directorial rulebook.
The film stars Zhou Xun as a television host named Jia Jia. Instead of a dramatic medical reveal, Chan introduces her condition through a small, public slip where she forgets the term "AI" and substitutes "artificial talent" during a live discussion. Chan says he was determined to avoid making a preachy "issue movie" about a disease, focusing instead on disintegrating family relationships.
He says he wanted to root the perspective in the patient's experience. This approach led to visual metaphors, like a leaking faucet that distorts into a flooded parking garage in Jia Jia's mind.
The "know when to stop" part of the motto became crucial in the editing room. Chan originally shot an ending where four unknown actors silently replaced the main cast to visualize Jia Jia seeing her family as strangers. He says it was too jarring and reshot the finale, having Zhou's character recite old broadcast lines to her family as if they were unfamiliar.
Chan also applied the "go with the flow" principle to directing Zhou Xun, who he hadn't worked with since 2005. He was uncertain she could portray a cranky, financially strained character but let her find the performance herself rather than pushing her toward it.
